Smart lighting systems include lights disposed in several locations and coupled with one or more smart controllers in a lighting network. The controllers can control which lights are on or off at different times and/or under various light conditions. For example, some light controllers may turn off a light responsive to an ambient light at or near the light rising above a threshold level and/or may turn the light on responsive to the ambient light at or near the light falling below the same threshold or a different threshold. This can allow for lights to automatically turn on at dusk or night and automatically turn off at sunrise or during daylight.
One problem with these systems and controllers can include the inability to turn off networked lights after a failure of the controller or other hardware circuitry in the system. For example, the software running on the controller can crash (e.g., stop working as intended for at least a temporary time period) and prevent the controller from turning off one or more lights during daylight hours. This can result in the consumption of energy to power the lights that is not needed or desired.